There's something uniquely beautiful about acoustic pianos, even against other instruments.

Consisting of 8,000+ parts and supporting 20-tonnes of string-tension with a 100+ year old design and only a one-dimensional (although multiplied by 88) interface to control that mechanism.

Any piano performance is the sum of careful collaboration between suppliers all over the globe with the best materials coming from Canada, Alaska, New Zealand, Australia, Africa, and all over Europe before being assembled by highly skilled artisans (often across factories in multiple continents) then carefully regulated and tuned at its final destination by a technician that has trained for many years... finally the pianist adds their own small personal expression via keys that depress barely 10mm.

Without the pianist, all of that work (sometimes more than 12 months of manufacturing) cannot be appreciated. Without this feat of global cooperation and engineering, the pianist has no voice! No wonder this instrument, when manufactured with care and in the hands of a skilled pianist, never fails to captivate even the most discerning audiences. The ultimate example of collaboration between artists and technicians.

The king of instruments? I think so.